OK, so watch this one too.

I found this funny in multiple ways. I'm a big fan of the Clearplay DVD player, and this is somewhat of a spoof on the idea of tweaking movie content to make it family-friendly. It's funny like that. My biggest laugh, though, is the final line. Check it out.

Go straight, and go fast!

We talked about this video on our Ape Cave adventure today. Sorry if any NASCAR fans out there are offended, but I personally think it's hilarious!

Ape Cave (with Venturing Crew 628)

Here I am emerging after a couple miles underground in Ape Cave. I got into some weird luminous fluorescent lichens and my brain began to glow.
This lovely lava tube is up by Mt. St. Helens and it's fun and cool (42 degrees to be exact). I posted a load of pictures on the Crew 628 blog here.

Please, Try the Fish

Well, I've got a few caption options for this one. The first is above and is a throwback for all you "Happy Days" fans. The second would be, "Who's your frydaddy?" The third would be, "I am the frymaster. Soon, I will need a Thighmaster."
Our neighbors Ben and Kelly are the best. They just bought 100 pounds of fresh local tuna and passed some to us. This is in addition to helping me trap the raccoons under my house a couple months ago, loaning and giving me tools, and being available and willing to help me carry heavy objects into my house. If they don't need an emergency root canal on the weekend soon, there's no way I'll ever catch up!
Anyway, once they gave me the fish and a short "fish frying 101" (I am very much a rookie at this) course in the driveway, I ran and got some tartar sauce, washed the fish, cut it up, dried it, mixed up the batter (from a mix they gave me . . . better make that an emergency root canal AND an avulsed tooth), battered the fish, and cooked it up in Canola at 375 in my Fry Daddy. I also called my mom for some advice on how to know it's done (FYI: going by the color is the best) and I must say, this fish is super-delicious and not at all fishy. I am now less-impressed with the Bowpicker in Astoria. They still have very good tuna fish and chips, but now I actually know it's something I can do so the magic has waned.

Those Fish Better Be Bitin'

Heading out this morning, I got to the quaint, usually quiet, 4-way stop near my house (by the store-formerly-known-as-Corkey's) and there were lights and an officer directing traffic. Soon, I realized why. Trucks were waiting in line to put their boats in at the Hammond Mooring Basin. This line, as you can see, goes clear down to the end. Then, it goes about this far again before it gets to the boat ramp. My neighbor (who caught 3 Chinook salmon today and released them because he didn't know the season was currently allowing you to keep them . . . I guess the rules are sporadic), who just bought a bunch of fresh tuna and gave it to me, said he had to wait in line earlier but it started at the far corner. It still took an hour before he got his boat in the water. You're left to figure these people were about to wait roughly 2 hours, then. Thus, those fish better be bitin', because it's hard to think it's worth buying the boat, buying the truck, driving an hour or two, and then having to wait a couple hours to get in the water. It's a lot easier to just have a neighbor that gives you fish (like I do). I highly recommend this plan.

Little Girl: 1, Daddy: 0

Well, she found a way to win. My wife took off to a cooking class tonight (seafood), and I was left in charge of the youngsters. My daughter put up a lot of ruckus, whining, and crying. I calmly repeatedly told her she could play marbles with W, get a treat, get down, etc., after she finished her dinner. Dinner was pizza, and still all she ate was a pickle. So, then I looked over and she'd assumed this position.


Yep, she camped at the table so long she fell asleep. Thus, without eating, she got out of her chair. She'd been there for a couple hours by this point, and I put her pajamas on her, brushed her teeth (of course), said prayers, and now she's in bed. Last night she delighted us with wailing at 2:45, and considering how hungry she'll be, I'd imagine tonight will be similar. Maybe she'll give us a concert at 4:00 too . . . yay!

Why Al Gore Hates AT&T

Many of you may have heard the saga of people receiving their first month's statement from AT&T Wireless since starting to use their iPhone. Well, I got mine today, and it's 39 PAGES! As you can see from the photo, there are a lot of pages there. My son would be keen to point out (due to his mad counting skills), however, that the image shows only 20 pages. They are double-sided! (and, I am not left-handed) The statements reach this length due to the fact that AT&T generates a line on it for each time you access the data network. For some reason, they think it's very important for me to know at exactly what time on what day I sent 48 kb across the network. It really would make no difference to ANY iPhone user, because all the eligible plans have unlimited data (for $20 less a month than what I was previously paying, by the way). Thus, I'm left to reason that AT&T must be doing this to ease the fears of a few paranoid people who listen to a lot of Rockwell and feel someone is covertly using their iPhone at 4 AM (or that the CIA is spying on their playlists . . . "Send in the paratroopers, he's subscribing to an Al-Jazeera podcast!").
For those who try to be ecologically-minded (I count myself among them, but Mr. Sans Auto has me beat hands-down), I'll point out here that I will be recycling this. And, I have signed up for paperless billing. In fact, I technically did this prior to receiving the bill after I heard it might be heading my way. Alas, I was too late. Maybe next month.

Ready for Everest

By popular demand, and because the whole episode has been good for laughs, this clipping begged to be posted here on the blog. It all began Friday evening when the laptop popped up that I'd gotten an email. It was from my brother's wife, who lives in New York, and said: "You made it to the top!! Way to go!! After all your crazy bike races and helicopter rides you get put in the paper for this? Were you the first DR team to make it to the top or something? Where's the blog post on this huge accomplishment? Too funny!" Soon, a text message from my brother arrived, saying, "Saddle Mt! Wow! You animal." I replied, "We ran out of oxygen and I had to carry Alan down." So, here's the blog post.
When I got the email, I hadn't even seen the article. I ran to the front door and grabbed my newspaper, whipped it open, said, "No way!" and showed my wife. She thought it was funny too. Yes, they do let dentists out of the office every once in a while, and we go climb things!
Here's a quote from Oregon State Parks:
"Two and a half miles. That's all it is from the parking lot (elev. 1,650') to the summit of Saddle Mountain (elev. 3,283'). Be prepared to marvel at the sheer volume of natural beauty packed onto the mountain, from a mature forest setting to fields of wildflowers to an open rocky summit. The view from the top of the mountain is one that cannot be described ... it must be experienced."
It's really a neat climb, and I've probably done it about 15 times since it's the high point here in the county. I chose to run up it and time myself one time and made it in 39 minutes. There are great views of many clearcuts but also you can see several of the Cascade peaks including Mt. Rainier, Mt. St. Helens, Mt. Hood, and Mt. Jefferson. It's also a cool angle looking toward Astoria. I am somewhat vindicated by a webpage that says the difficulty of the hike is "challenging", which can be found here.
So, of course, this came out Friday and then I had two weddings yesterday. So, people had a good time razzing me about it. Then, I had church today as well, providing lots of other opportunities for people to express their awe of my mountaineering prowess. Actually, I'm surprised to find out how many people are from here and have never even climbed the mountain. Needless to say, if everybody knew who Ed Viesturs* is, they'd be comparing me to him.
*the first American to climb all 14 of the world's 8000 meter peaks without supplemental oxygen. He also recently completed his 200th ascent of Mt. Rainier. He's pretty good.

I LOVE . . . iTunes Smart Playlists

Brace yourselves . . . periodically I will have opinions on this blog. Today, pretty much just before and during dinner (as I lunged to the laptop between bites much to Laura's chagrin), I started playing with Smart Playlists in iTunes. Before today, I didn't know they even existed. But then, I was on my way to work this morning in the GTI (which I also LOVE . . . maybe another day I will verbosify that topic) and I learned something. On the podcast I was listening to ("The Apple Phone Show"), one of the commentators talked about how the 8 gigs on the iPhone isn't that bad of a limitation and explained why. He said he sets up a Smart Playlist in iTunes with certain conditions so he always has stuff to listen to that he hasn't heard in a while. Pulling down the File --> New Smart Playlist, I discovered fantastic features. Using pull-down boxes, you can set it up so you have a live-updated list that meets any of a zillion criteria. In order to set up a list of music I haven't heard in a while, I can set multiple conditions like "last played is not in the past 90 days", "genre is not Christmas", "artist is not Yanni", and so on. Once I've heard a song on the list, either at home or on my phone, it disappears and a new one that fits the criteria joins the list.
So yeah, everybody in cyberspace probably had this mastered already. But if I can bring this joy to just one soul, it's worth it.

Coast Guard Helicopter Flight of the Eagle

Somebody's ready for the thrill of a lifetime! So for the next Flight of the Eagle, I'm going to grow a moustache, wear different glasses, etc. and see if I can sneak on again!

Seems like a cool "right stuff" pose. And, when you have a cool rescue swimmer physique, you don't zip the jumpsuit up any sooner than you have to.

"So let me see if I've got this right. You point the rocket AWAY from yourself before firing it, then?" It's actually a locator device they can mark an area with and then see how it drifts in the current.

These helicopters were supposed to serve 5000 hours and then be replaced. This one, we were told, has about 10,000 on it and is supposed to serve until 20,000. Hey, I have an idea . . . let's go fly in it! I suppose when you're being plucked off a cliff or out of a sinking vessel, you don't complain.

More Coast Guard Helicopter Photos

I was pleased at the ready availability of the defibrillator.

So Matt (the Eagle) got to sit RIGHT BY the open door. Good thing he has Eagle Powers.

The pilot gave us a nice briefing ahead of time making us feel important and telling us we're part of the crew and need to watch for other aircraft and stuff. We also got instructions on how, when one of these "planes" (as they like to call it in the biz) goes down in the water, it's so top-heavy that it rolls over. It's important to keep belted in until it rolls. Keep your eyes fixed on a reference point so you can keep oriented as you get out. Also, don't inflate your life vest too soon. It really set us at ease. :-)


"No, Matt, you DON'T get to sit over there. That's where your dad gets to sit. You're young and expendable, so you'll be sitting over here by me!" (he's the guy that's strapped in a lanyard thing and hangs in the doorway to run the hoist and stuff).

More Coast Guard Helicopter Ride Photos

Look, it's the Peter Iredale shipwreck (the subject of other recent photos in this blog!) We didn't get to fish anybody out of the water. But, we did see a whale near the surf and they radioed it in.


Here we're doing a high banking turn. I had to clench my stomach pretty hard. They also did a maneuver or two where you felt weightless. I had my camera floating above my hand. It was sweet. And again, I had to clench my guts and try not to hurl.


We did that high banking turn and then dropped in fast over downtown Astoria. Quite fast. The pilot weaved side-to-side and apparently flew sideways some also. We were responsible to signal the start of the Astoria Regatta parade at noon. Right in the middle of this picture next to the red and green trolley bus is the dental office.


We did a couple laps around the Column, also. Somehow, I'm more nervous leaning against the rails at the top of the Column than I am in the helicopter with the door wide open. And, I was just wearing a wimpy little lap belt that's as old as the helicopter (which is pretty old). Who knows?

When you're in the Coast Guard, you can buzz the Cape Disappointment Lighthouse and not get in trouble.


Here below the Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center are the cliff caves they used in The Guardian (a movie which, like "The Perfect Storm" is on the short list of Coast Guard glory flicks.


Hey, I can see my house from here! They actually circled it several times. I knew the pilot had the right one figured out when he said, "The one with the kiddie pool?" L and the kids and her parents were outside and got to wave. E talked to me about the helicopter when I got home.


I have NO IDEA why they have a large moosehead on the wall at the Coast Guard flight building. But, they do, and it is really, really big. Like, I thought they were about the same size as an elk, but now I've gotta believe they're even bigger.

Ice Blocking Activity

We had a "joint activity" (young men and young women together) this Wednesday and they wanted to go ice blocking. I went and bought 6 10 lb blocks of ice and also threw in a big sheet of cardboard, which was also a hit. We went to Astoria Middle School and had a lot of fun. I found it worked best for me (yes, I slid down 5 or 6 times) to put a towel on top the ice block and sit with the block sideways. It goes a little slower and it's easier to keep under you. It really takes some balance, though. In any case, these are a few of the photos I think are cool. More can be found on crew628.blogspot.com.


JJ, Sean, and Heather cruisin' on a cardboard toboggan.


The ice block reached the bottom of the hill long before Jacob did.


Ride 'em cowboy!


Thomas' expression on the front says it all. Good times!

Evening Fun at Peter Iredale Beach

Fitting that he's wearing his Dash sweatshirt. He's moving so quickly he warped!


Happy almost birthday boy on the beach. He stopped just long enough for a picture.


W especially likes the running if it involves chasing.


E and her cousins had fun digging in the sand. Here she pauses and gives us an accidental seal pose.

Evening Beach Fun at Peter Iredale

W loves to run on the beach. Really fast, I might add.


E is very very concerned about . . . something . . .


Ahhh, the famous wreck of the Peter Iredale. It's neat to have it so close to home.


W leads "the train" around on the beach.

Big Birthday #5!

The happy birthday crowd. Mom and Dad Z came from Portland and Kristin, Maren, and Elaina were in the house as well. It was a Disney/Pixar Cars party, and W wanted to climb right into his Cars sleeping bag immediately after he opened it.

L made a wheat/dairy-free cake for W that was actually pretty rich, chocolatey, and tasty. W did well with the cake and worked hard to blow out his #5 candle. Then he pulled it out of the cake and started trying to eat it. He actually ate very little of the cake. Go figure. The present-opening went OK . . . he didn't run off crying, but he wasn't that stoked either. He did respond to some encouragement to open them. He later spent a whole lot of time today with the marble tower set and was identifying the states on the lid of the puzzle he got. He also had no trouble picking out the planets in his new books. The grandparents know this boy's interests!

Cousin Elaina especially enjoyed the whipped creamy Jello that came with lunch. So did Grandpa Z. L made Greek pita bread turkey burgers that were delicious. We ate them outside on the deck. It was breezy but nice. We're glad W wasn't born in June because the mosquitoes eating us would've made our eating very uncomfortable.

E was very happy with the whole birthday thing and was later complaining that she's ready for her birthday RIGHT NOW!